


2.47 Billion

by sanity_not_in_tact



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Episode Related: The Day of the Doctor, Sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-11
Updated: 2014-11-11
Packaged: 2018-02-24 23:52:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2600966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanity_not_in_tact/pseuds/sanity_not_in_tact
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Changes tense and perspective</p><p>The Doctor on the day he blew up Gallifrey</p>
            </blockquote>





	2.47 Billion

**Author's Note:**

> so the changes of tense and perspective may be a little confusing, but they're meant to juxtapose, so it's not just for the hell of it.
> 
> bear with me, and be patient.

2.47 Billion

The Doctor and Clara stroll through the line of double doors to the back of the museum, arguing about whether or not the doctor has a job, or some similarly petty issue. A troop of soldiers of UNIT and their mistress tail behind. The Doctor stops where the long walk ends, a large frame covered by a sheet blocking their path.

 

Here I stand, a million thoughts spinning through my head simultaneously. Clara stands beside me, and a dozen members of UNIT stand behind, as I watch the curtain fall from the frame of the great masterpiece before me.  
Everybody stops talking. Clara's eyes widen with amazement, mine wilt with the dread for the memories waiting to come. I remember the fire, the screams and the despair. I remember my wife's hand holding mine as I wept over my son's broken body. I feel my hearts ache with memories. Memories of the sound of gunfire, the pain of losing my family. Everybody. One by one. Endless battle. Endless pain. Endless war.   
“That... But, that's not possible.” Clara says, amazement colouring her tone.  
“No more.” I say, without thinking.  
“That's the title-” Kate begins  
“I know the title.” that comes out a bit harsh  
“-also known as 'Gallifrey Falls'”  
“This painting doesn't belong here. Not in this time or place.” I say, the act of indifference coming naturally.  
“Obviously” says Clara.  
“It's the fall of Archadia, Gallifrey's second city.”

 

And then I see it, the exact street I stood on the day I did it. The wall on which I engraved those words; 'NO MORE'.

 

I fired the last shot, finishing the last stroke on the 'E'.   
“The Doctor is detected!” came the cold cries of the Daleks. “Seek, Locate, Destroy.”  
My old legs dragged as I struggled to reach the TARDIS in time, my weak fingers shook as I fumbled with the lock.

 

“But... How is it doing that? How is that possible?” says Clara. “It's an oil painting... in 3D.”  
“Timelord art, bigger on the inside, a slice of real time. Frozen.” The simple mindset on which the English language is based can be so limiting when explaining these things. Hence the reason why I don't often bother.

 

The TARDIS landed in the Caldarn Desert, the perfect place, out in the middle of nowhere. My feet shuffled wearily as I trudged through the hot, dry sand. The heat bore down on my neck and dry, choking dust filled my throat, making me suddenly very thirsty.  
“None of it matters much anymore” I thought out loud. “I'm very soon to die anyway. We're all going to die today. It must end. The pain and suffering must end. It must stop. No more. No more. No more”  
I said the words in an attempt to reassure myself that this was the right decision. It was the only way to end the pain forever. There was no other way.   
I never entirely convinced myself, but then again, I was about to commit genocide. My own people, completely destroyed.  
I will never forgive myself for what I did that day, yet I know that there was no other way, and that it was not possible to get it right. 

 

I held my hand an inch above the button to trigger the bomb. To devour my world in flame, destroying everything I love, and everything else as well. Everything except me. That was the price I had to pay and, though I dreaded it, I truly believed I deserved the pain and the loss, a punishment for what I was about to do.  
“What I am about to do today is not out of fear or hatred, but because there is no other way.” 

 

//////// I clutched my head and fell to the floor. I could feel the light of all their souls going out one by one. The pain and confusion and anger and despair was all I could hear in those few terrible minutes. I forced my eyes closed, forced myself to face what I'd done, to delve into the desperate minds of my people, only to feel them go out like the flames on a billion candles left out to flutter and die in the winds of a raging storm.  
It was ending. And with my brilliant mind, I would remember the exact moment that each and every one of my people died.   
I walked amongst the light of their souls, quickly dying as each one was smothered. One second I'm standing in a world of brightly coloured lights, the next moment, I find myself desperately flailing my mind about, exerting all my energy to reach out for their minds. Maybe I could salvage just one. But I knew it was useless. Still I kept running. Panting with effort and screaming her name. My wife's name. Just so that I could say goodbye. And to apologise for something I could never undo.  
It got darker and darker as I kept running. I ran and I ran and I ran. I lost count of the seconds ticking by. The last light went out, but still I kept running. The drumming of my feet evened out. I tried to steady my mind with the rhythm of my mental body, the jogging, my breath, and the quick pace of my aching hearts. I was swimming around in darkness, like a lone ant drowning in the depths of a pot of black paint. There was nothing to see. The great Gallifreyan Mind that once bound us all was manned by only one soul.   
The world around me seemed to get lighter. A spark of hope filled my chest as I forced myself to run a bit faster. It got lighter and lighter and lighter. I kept running, hardly daring to hope that they'd been saved after all. Lighter, lighter, lighter still, until I stood in a world made of blaring white light. But my hopes withered and died as I looked around me. There was nothing to see. What I had mistaken for light was merely the absence of dark. There was nothing there. The absence of everything. No up, no down, No North, South, East or west. There was no colour or sound or texture at all. There was no despair, no anger or loss or pain or fear, except me. No happiness, no joy, no laughter or song. ////////  
And then there was me. And I realised that, although I would mourn them and feel their pain, I was the only TimeLord left alive, and therefore I must be the last TimeLord to live. It would be disgraceful, pointless, and would only cause more suffering if I never once woke from this despair. And that is why I must live. To be happy and sad, angry and joyful, I must love and hope and give and take and laugh and cry and I must be The Doctor, the Oncoming Storm, the Bringer of Darkness, the Hoper of Far-flung Hopes, the Hero, the Saviour, the last of the TimeLords.  
I opened my eyes, and there I lay in the eerily creaking shed, time ticking by as if nothing had happened, as if it's masters were still alive and thriving. Isn't the Universe a funny place? For such a terrible thing to have happened, and no sign of it apparent at all.

 

Almost everybody the Doctor meets has seen him in pain, some have seen it many times. He's lost so much, all the love in his life would flare, give him hope, but soon fade and die away, leaving the Doctor feeling like the lonely man he will always be. That was the curse of the TimeLords, of near-immortality.  
But nobody ever saw the Doctor the day he counted them. He summoned the TARDIS from that old shed he locked himself in while he destroyed his people and, once inside the cool air of the TARDIS, his mind cleared. The counting begun. He started with his son, and didn't stop. He couldn't. He tried every distraction he could, but nothing worked, so he resigned and fell into the chair in the control room, his head in his hands and his shoulders shaking gently as he counted every soul that burned in the flames of the Time War. Every child, one by one.  
Nobody will ever know the pain the Doctor felt the day he counted.  
2.47 billion children. Dead.


End file.
